


Head to Wind

by Ariasune



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, One with the Sky Zine, Sora Is a Ray of Sunshine (Kingdom Hearts), Sora-centric (Kingdom Hearts)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-20 15:47:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30007194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ariasune/pseuds/Ariasune
Summary: A young Sora befriends a strange man, with a weird name, and a smelly coat.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 21





	Head to Wind

**Author's Note:**

> This was my piece in [One with the Sky Zine (Sora KH, 2020)](https://twitter.com/sorasky_zine). 
> 
> Originally, I wanted to write something very introspective and artsy, but this is _waaaaaay_ better.

The Destiny Islands float bright as seafoam on the surface of Darkness, a shining reflection where the Realm of Light reaches the tenebrous ocean below. Tilt them to the metaphysical left and this entire world—these Islands and all its people— plunge into some endless dawn between. Only a little to the right and it falls to Darkness instead.

But none of that happens.

Instead Destiny Island rests, suspended in the Light; the tide moves, the sun wanes, and children carelessly chase one another back and forth across the sand.

The delicacy of this world, its strange fragility fascinates the Master of Masters. Perhaps that is why he has come here again. But then again, perhaps it is the excellent Paopu Colada.

And yes. He is _technically_ cheating the rules. Coming here —Light knows, _especially_ now—he is teasing the timelines into tangles. He is risking everything he has ever worked for, his life’s work and yet-- and yet! He cannot find it in himself to care! Not with self-recrimination an ache in his chest and the sweet sound of a ukulele drifting on the breeze.

It is, after-all, impossible to doubt himself indefinitely; he must eventually give in.

He is three sips, two sighs, and strictly one guest into his self-appointed pity party, when he is oh-so- _rudely_ interrupted by an uninvited arrival:

“Aren’t you hot wearing that?”

It’s the kid. He’s lousy guessing at ages for pint-sizes: might be six, might be nine--what do children look like anyway? Doesn’t matter, because his eyes are as fierce as the sea below, as curious as the sky above and they are _fixed_ on the Master of Masters.

_Of course it’s the kid_ , he thinks to himself, leaning back against the paopu trunk, _of course it is_.

A little hand plucks at the tail of his Shadow Cloak, pulling at the magically-imbued material and stretching it. “That looks _stinky_ hot.” The Master tugs the coat away and the boy gives a mischievous grin. “You’re gonna get all sweaty with your hood up.”

“Anyone ever teach you not to talk to strangers?” the Master drawls, amused and annoyed all at the same time.

“Oh yeah, for sure.” The kid clambers over the trunk of the paopu, hanging off it and smiling at him. “I’m Sora.”

“Oh?”

“I’m Sora. What’s your name?”

He hasn’t given his name to anyone in such a long time, and he isn’t about to start now: “Sorry kiddo, I don’t tell that to strangers.”

Sora huffs, “But I’m not a stranger! I just _told_ you my name! I’m _Sora_.”

“Hah!” the Master is effortlessly surprised, tipping his head back to laugh. “Guess I can’t argue with that, huh? My name, hm... it’s ***Mis̛͞s͡i҉ng̢̕** N͞͡o.͘.”

“Huh, really?”

The Master chuckles, “What? You don’t believe me?”

“Nah!” Sora swings by his arms, feet scuffing at the sand. Still chuckling, the Master reaches up to lower the hood so he can honestly meet Sora’s sparkling smile and unknowing eyes. “It’s nice to meet you,” Sora gushes eagerly.

“It’s nice to meet you too,” he lies absently, tilting his head to let the breeze pin his hair to his throat. It’s quiet, save the warm wash of the water across sand and he’s just about to close his eyes when he’s interrupted again.

“Why are you sighing?”

He doesn’t know why he thought the kid would leave him alone. Reluctantly he turns towards Sora’s inquisitive expression. “Eh, it’s a bit too grown up for you.” He’s being dismissive, which means he gets to enjoy Sora puff up like a pink balloon.

“I am _too_ grown up!”

The Master gestures an inch or two above fluffy brown hair. “Gotta be _this_ tall to ride this drama, squirt.”

Determined, Sora slides off the paopu trunk and gets up on his tiptoes, teetering in the sand. But the top of his head bumps under the Master of Master’s hand, and Sora brightens with triumph. “Now you gotta tell me what’s wrong."

"Why do you wanna know?" the Master asks instead and peers up the beach: left, right. "Don’t you have better things to do, like playing with your… You know. Your…" He waves his hand in idle circles. “Spendy-time-with-people.”

Sora squints at him. "... Friends?"

"Sure. Yeah. Those."

A blossoming of giggles. “You’re weird.” Sora hops up onto the paopu trunk next to the Master and swings his feet. One of his sandals slides down his foot to his toes. “Don’t you have any?”

“Eh?” He glances at the smiley kid to his side. “Don’t have...? Oh. Friends? Haha heh, nah. I don’t have those.”

“What?” Sora squeaks.

“Yep.” The Master shrugs. “Went cold turkey.”

That pulls a frown out of the kid, and the Master leans his head against his hand and smiles, the expression hidden in the curve of his palm. He’s about to say something—glib, and cryptic, the way he likes it—when Sora perks up, “That’s okay then, I’ll be your friend.”

He snorts. “Uh. No.”

“It’s okay! We’re already buddies,” Sora insists. “Wow, I can’t believe I’m your first friend.”

“What?” He scoffs, “You are not my first friend. And even if we were friends—which we’re not—I can do way better than some Island baby—”

“Hey!” Sora protests. “I’m not a baby! I’m four and _three_ -quarters!”

“Psh.” (So that’s how old the kid is, huh?) “Doesn’t matter, you’re still a half-pint. I can do better. Hah. I _have_ done better.”

That might be a little too much information, because Sora seizes on it like a kitten on a sunbeam. “So you _had_ friends?”

“I do _not_ want to talk about it,” he answers flatly and Sora leans in with huge eyes.

He whispers tersely, a little hand cupped to his mouth: “Are you not friends anymore?”

The question cuts him off. Cuts him off right at the smirks and sighs and snide remarks, and the Master stares at Sora. The kid looks so genuinely baffled and worried for _him_ —of all people—it makes his stomach hurt. _Light_ , he marvels, _kid’s lip might even be quivering_.

The Master turns away with a groan. “Let’s talk about something else, kay?”

“‘Kay...” Sora nods and for a moment, for a _moment_ he thinks that’s the end of that. “So why were you sighing?”

“Oh come on!” The Master rubs his temples. “I thought you were gonna give me a break, kid!”

“But you’re _sad_!” Sora protests. “I wanna help!”

“No,” he snaps, “no you don’t. This isn’t something you _want_.” The Master buries his face in his hand. “It’s… how to put this in words you’ll understand… it’s _messy_ and _stupid_ and a—” He makes a large gesture with both arms, “And a mega pain in the butt!”

It’s amazing, watching the kid’s face squish up thoughtfully. Even more amazing when Sora announces: “My teachers say I’m a mega pain in the butt.”

The Master stares for a beat, before murmuring, “Yeah, I’ll bet they do.” He rolls his eyes. “ _Anyway_. What’s your point?”

“I’m a _Pro-fess-ion-al_ ,” Sora sounds the word out proudly, “in being a pain in the butt.”

The Master huffs, looking Sora up and down, “And you’re even messy.”

That’s not even that unkind; Sora’s hair is sticking up every which way with drying sand and saltwater; kid looks like he took a roll down a sand dune. “And stupid.” He pokes at Sora’s forehead teasingly.

“Hey!”

“Your words, not mine.”

“So. I can help?” Sora presses, bouncing in his spot and making the paopu tree shake.

“Yeah, sure,” the Master shakes his head, laughing and waves a hand, “Why not, right?” He taps a fingertip to his mouth. “But gotta put it in terms a little terror like you will understand. Okay, so. How’s your geography?” Sora’s head tilts. “Riiiight. Rudimentary. Cool. Cool cool cool.”

After a few moments spent muttering to himself, he starts simple: “Once upon a time, there were… hundreds, no, thousands of Islands, and they were really far apart. They didn’t even know the others were there! Everyone thought they were the only people in the _entire_ ocean.”

“But that’s stupid?”

“That’s what I’ve been saying!” The Master points at Sora’s nose, “And even stupider, people only ever stayed in one place.” He holds up his finger. “One world, one sky, one destiny.”

Sora wriggles about next to him, and his little eyebrows furrow, “That sounds lonely. And boring.”

“It _was_ ,” the Master sighs, fanning his face in the heat. “Anyway I think to myself, hey we don’t have to live this way! I’ll make uh-- a boat. From Light. To bring us together… to connect the Worlds in One Kingdom. Heh. Like one big party, whoo-hoo!”

He pumps his fist, and Sora pumps his back, giggling, but then the mood gutters, falters in the lee of the Master’s throat. He can feel it aching.

“But…” he swallows, and clasps his hands together, “Kingdom… Islands. It didn’t really work out the way I thought it would.” His gaze stumbles out to the horizon, losing his focus where sea meets sky. “Turns out, if you bring everyone together, you have to take them from somewhere.

“I couldn’t create Light from nothing. And all those Islands. They started… disappearing back into the sea. Cause I was stealing the Light from them for myself.”

“That’s awful,” Sora mumbles. “Why didn’t you stop? If you knew it was hurting the Islands...”

“You think I didn’t try?” the Master murmured, hands tensing. “I tried all kinds of things. I even tried to create this-- sort of an Island Order to try and stop more worlds from disappearing, but by then, it was like trying to sail into the wind. I didn’t have any control. Sometimes you...” His voice cracks. “...Sometimes you start games you don’t know how to stop.”

Humming sadly, Sora looks down at the sand, his feet kick-kick-kicking in the air. Silent.

This, finally, is what the Master wanted. For the kid to stop asking difficult questions. For this whole nightmare to be over. To give up, and hide in this world like a scaredy-cat.

A ‘fraidy-cat who had a fancy drink in a coconut shell, with one of those little paper umbrellas, but still _essentially_ a coward.

“I guess that makes you the bad guy,” Sora says quietly.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “I guess it does.”

Quiet, Sora reaches over to pat a small hand over the top of his clasped ones. A gentle gesture that does nothing to help him. A little feeling lost in the tide, as it gathers itself, pulls and pushes and _shoves_ the whole world around. Sora is sweet, small, and so honest. But so, so helpless: just another clueless kid from an Island, comforting a coward who got everything wrong by heading to wind.

Turn this world to its right and time suspends.

Twist it to the left and darkness descends.

It’s like unlocking a door that doesn’t go anywhere.

“Why can’t you make Light from nothing?” Sora’s hand squeezes tight around the Master’s like a pulse and blue eyes blink beacon-like at him. “Doesn’t Light come from inside of us?”

“Still coming from something, half-pint. I had to find that out the hard way.”

“But you didn’t wanna be alone and that’s a good thing!” Sora presses one hand over his heart, hope and defiance rising like an ocean inside him. “That’s Light that came from you! Nowhere else!”

“You don’t get it.” The Master didn’t really expect him to, so he isn’t even disappointed. He touches over his own Heart instead. “A Shining Heart is a terrible thing. It takes and takes and takes until there’s nothing left. The Light you’re talking about… it’s fake.”

“You wanted _friends_ ,” Sora shakes his head. “That’s real. That’s light.”

“Kid, loneliness isn’t the same thing as Light.”

“You’re being a butt!” Sora jumps off to stand in front of him, mouth quirking into a scowl. “You’re looking at it half-empty just cause you wanna!”

“Of course I am! The maths is pretty definitive.” The Master groans. “One plus one is just another way of saying one minus one. All depends which side of the equation you’re on really.”

“That’s stupid, maths is stupid,” Sora insists. “Why don’t you just change sides?”

“You say that so easily,” the Master says, contempt bitter and painful inside him. It knocks against his ribcage like a heart hammering at the door. “You really think you can win this if you let your Heart guide you?”

“Yes! My Heart is Light!” Sora says so fiercely, so brightly that abruptly the Master is furious, desperate, arguing with a _child_.

“Your Heart is _ruinous_ ,” he hisses. “It will take everything from you!” His words begin to break into wounded pieces. “You think you know everything, but all you have are _stupid_ , childish dreams! And the closer you get to them, the longer the Shadow you’ll make. But you don’t know anything at all so give up and leave me alone!”

“No! We’re friends and I’m not giving up!” Sora screws his hands up and shouts back, recklessly and with no doubt, no fear, no spite. “I’ll prove it to you! I’ll prove that friendship makes us stronger, and that maths is stupid, and that even if the future is dark and lonely and empty, that it doesn’t have to be!" His eyes blaze. " _I’ll prove that our Hearts are Light!_ ”

It’s like tilting his world to the left. It’s like unlocking a door that wasn’t there before. It feels weightless and warm. Like the worlds aren’t pulling him down into the shadowy sea; it feels... _Light_.

“...Do you think you can prove that?” he asks, quiet as he gets to his feet, wind pushing at his back. “That even if I’m the Bad Guy, my Heart is Light too?”

Sora is all open certainty; the gleaming line where horizon becomes sea and sky. The shining, tenuous Hope balanced between Light and Dark. An Island with a precarious Destiny, and a small boy with bright eyes and a brighter heart that won’t take Darkness for an answer.

“I know it is.” Sora reaches his hand out. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”


End file.
